The Traitor (29 page)

The rest of the visit flew by, and as time was called for it to come to an end, Frankie shuffled awkwardly in her seat. ‘Dad, there is something I need to know and I want you to tell me the truth.’

‘Go on,’ Eddie said.

‘That night in Tilbury when Mum died, did you mean to kill Jed?’

‘Time’s up. Say goodbye now, Mitchell,’ one of the screws said, as he hovered next to Eddie.

Ignoring his daughter’s question, Eddie gave Frankie a big hug. ‘Thanks for what you did for me in court. When you coming to see me again?’

Frankie let go of him and stared him straight in the eyes. ‘You haven’t answered my question, Dad. Did you or didn’t you?’

Eddie shook his head. ‘Of course I didn’t. What kind of man do you think I am, Frankie? All I wanted to do was pay Jed some cash to stay out of your life and when he wasn’t there, I decided to scare him, OK?’

Frankie smiled. He was telling the truth, she was sure of that. She held Georgie towards him so he could kiss her goodbye. ‘You’re a good man, Dad, and I want you to know that I forgive you for everything that has happened and I will always love you.’

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

Aware that his daughter, Sally, was yet again in floods of tears, Terry Baldwin lifted his grandson out of her arms.

Luke was now three months old and even though Sally had had a difficult birth and had since suffered with depression, Terry was beginning to lose patience with her.

As Sally poured herself another glass of wine, Terry shook his head in disgust. ‘You’ve gotta pull yourself together, girl. The answer to your problems ain’t in the bottom of a glass, you know.’

Sally dried her eyes and sipped her drink. She was gagging for Jed to see his son, but nobody knew where he had moved to.

Desperate to have his old daughter back, the happy one, Terry sat down beside her and put a comforting arm around her shoulder. ‘Look, babe, I know you loved that pikey lad, but you’ve just gotta move on with your life. Get yourself dolled up and go out with your mates and find yourself a new bloke. Me and Anne will babysit for you.’

Sally glared at her father. She still loved Jed, even though he had been a bastard to her, and she didn’t want any other bloke. Positive that once Jed laid eyes on his beautiful son, he would fall in love with her and they would live happily ever after, Sally decided to beg for her father’s help once again.

‘Please Dad, I really do need to see Jed, even if it’s only for closure. Please find him for me. Do it for Luke’s sake. As he gets older he has every right to know who his Daddy is, doesn’t he?’

Terry turned away from Sally’s pleading expression. It broke his heart to see his daughter so unhappy day in, day out. He stood up. He’d had months of this same conversation and he needed to put an end to it somehow.

‘OK, I’ll pay someone to find him for you, but I’m warning you, Sally, if Jed treats you like shit or upsets you, then I shall personally break every bone in the little fucker’s body. Now, do we understand one another?’

Sally smiled. Her dad had been a hard nut to crack on the subject of Jed, but finally she had got her own way.

Considering he was suffering from a dose of man-flu, Eddie Mitchell was in an extremely upbeat mood. The reason why was obvious – it was because Gina was coming to visit him again today. Thinking of Gina, Eddie grinned. He’d been nervous when she had first visited him, but he needn’t have been, as there had been an instant spark between them.

‘You’ve definitely got the look of a man in love, Ed. Book me in to be your best man,’ Stuart joked.

Eddie playfully punched Stuart. He and his cellmate often wound one another up. They enjoyed the banter and it also relieved the boredom.

As Eddie was let out of the cell, he briefly thought of Jessica. It was the same every time Gina came to visit; there was always a twinge of guilt.

Eddie sat down in the visiting room and thought of his daughter as he waited for Gina. Frankie had come to visit him again last week and he was becoming increasingly worried about her. Pale and drawn with dark bags under her eyes, Ed was positive that Frankie wasn’t happy with her life. Sadness seemed to be written all over her face.

‘Don’t be silly, Dad, everything’s fine at home,’ Frankie had insisted.

As Gina walked towards him, Eddie forgot about his daughter and concentrated on her. She always dressed in a classy way, but today she looked amazing in a black knitted coat, faded jeans, and knee-high black leather boots.

‘Wow, you look good enough to eat,’ Eddie joked as he kissed her.

Gina hugged him, then sat down. She’d had her fair share of blokes over the years, but none of them could hold a torch to the charismatic Eddie Mitchell.

‘So, how have you been?’ Eddie asked her.

‘I’ve been fine, thanks. Well, that’s apart from wishing every morning that I was waking up with you instead of on my own,’ Gina said teasingly.

Eddie held her gaze. Every time Gina had visited, they flirted that little bit more and he got off on tantalising her. Unbeknown to Gina, he’d had the occasional wank while thinking of her recently and his orgasms had been blinding.

‘Did you have any joy finding out any more stuff about me dad?’ Ed asked her.

Gina shook her head. Eddie had been paying her, via Raymond, to see if she could find out some new information about his father’s murder. ‘I went everywhere you told me to go, but no one knew anything, Ed. I’ll keep trying, but at the moment the trail is as cold as ice.’

As disappointed as he was, Eddie nodded understandingly. Bringing his old man’s killer to justice had kind of become an obsession with him, but apart from employing Gina and keeping his eyes and ears open in nick, there was very little he could do about it while he was on the inside.

Deciding to change the subject, Eddie squeezed Gina’s hand. ‘So, have you decided where you’re spending Christmas yet?’

‘Yeah, I’m going to my friend Claire’s on Christmas Day. She’s single, like me, so I’m going to stay there until the day after Boxing Day.’

Ed leaned towards her, tilted her chin and gazed into her eyes. ‘Why are you still calling yourself single when you’ve now got me?’

With the undeniable sexual tension between them, Gina lowered her eyes. ‘So are we officially an item then?’

Eddie noted that her hands were shaking and he smiled. She wanted him badly, he knew that. ‘It all depends if you’ll wait for me,’ he replied.

Gina nodded. ‘Of course I’ll wait.’

Eddie stroked her cheek and, unable to stop himself, leaned towards her and kissed her passionately. As one of the screws told him to calm things down, Ed pulled away and grinned. ‘You won’t regret waiting for me, babe, I’ll promise you that.’

On the day before Christmas Eve, Jed offered to drive Frankie over to her mother’s grave to lay some flowers.

‘Can’t I drive, Jed?’ Frankie asked him.

Jed shook his head. ‘The truck’s too big for you, Frankie. You’ve only just passed your test, ain’t ya?’

Instead of arguing, Frankie accepted his decision. She had passed her test six weeks ago now and she was positive that Jed hadn’t got her a car yet because he was planning on surprising her on Christmas Day.

‘Please give me a clue about what you’ve bought me,’ Frankie had begged him only yesterday.

‘No, it’ll spoil the surprise. All I’m telling you is it’s something I should have bought you ages ago and it’s something you really want.’

Frankie was thrilled by his answer. Georgie was nearly nine months old now and Frankie desperately wanted to be able to take her daughter to visit Joey or her grandparents while Jed was out working and stuff.

Joey and Frankie had called a truce a couple of weeks ago. They hadn’t spoken for months after her father’s court case but, with Christmas approaching, Frankie had called him again. She hadn’t told Jed the truth, she’d told him that Joey had rung her. They hadn’t met up yet, but Frankie was planning on spending Boxing Day with Joey and Dominic at her grandparents’ house and she was really looking forward to their reunion.

On the journey to Upminster Cemetery, Frankie sat daydreaming about her forthcoming independence. She could just imagine herself going shopping with Georgie in Romford Market or driving to that new Lakeside shopping centre that was to open in Thurrock during the next year.

‘You’re quiet, babe. You ain’t got the hump ’cause I wouldn’t let you drive, have ya?’

Frankie snapped out of her trance and smiled. Jed might be surprising her with a car on Christmas Day but, little did he know, she had an ever bigger surprise for him.

With the end of visiting time fast approaching, Gina decided to take the bull by the horns. There was one important question she needed to ask Eddie and, after her past experiences with men, she couldn’t avoid it any longer.

Gina felt hot under the collar as she began her planned speech. ‘Ed, there’s one thing I really need to ask you. My ex-boyfriend, Grant, the one I told you about, well, when me and him first got together we never discussed the subject of kids. That’s when it all went wrong because, after we’d moved in together, I found out that he’d had a vasectomy and had conveniently forgotten to tell me about it. I blew a fuse, so he had it reversed, but the operation wasn’t successful.’

Aware that Gina was having trouble spitting out the actual question, Eddie burst out laughing. ‘So you wanna know if I’ve been gelded, do ya?’

Usually so cool, calm and collected, Gina was annoyed as she felt herself blush. ‘I want to be with you whatever the situation, Ed, but I don’t want to build my hopes up of us perhaps one day having a family and that’s not possible. By the time you get out I’ll probably be thirty-five. I just need to know where I stand on this one. I know it’s a bit early to ask but, obviously, with you stuck in here, I have no choice.’

Eddie leaned towards Gina. Being in prison made you think strangely and he knew that he had already sort of fallen for her. ‘If you want my babies, then you shall have my babies, sweetheart.’

Gina’s eyes welled up. She had always dreamed of one day having a family, but until now had struggled to meet Mr Right. ‘I know we haven’t known one another very long, but I’m sure we can make this work, Ed.’

Eddie agreed. When Jessica had died he had never believed that he would find happiness again, especially this quickly and he was desperate to make things work.

Gina stood up. ‘I’d better go now. Will you be able to ring me tomorrow?’

Eddie grinned. ‘Only if you promise to keep that bed warm for me.’

Frankie hated visiting her mum’s grave. She found it too upsetting, so she only went at Christmas or on her mum’s birthday. She never stayed for long; just laid the flowers, said hello, told her mum she loved and missed her, and walked away.

‘Christ, that was quick,’ Jed said, as she got back in the truck.

Frankie lifted Georgie off her dad’s lap. ‘Where are we going now? I’m hungry. Shall we stop for some lunch somewhere?’ she asked.

‘Why don’t we go and put some flowers on your grandad’s grave first?’

Frankie shook her head. She hated visiting graves of any kind and, even though what had happened to her grandad was awful, she hadn’t been particularly close to him. ‘I never saw much of my grandad, so I’d rather just go for lunch, Jed, if you don’t mind.’

Jed did mind. He had his own reasons for wanting to go. ‘Let’s just take some flowers over there. You can stay in the motor if you want and I can lay them with Georgie. It’ll be nice for your dad. You can write to him and tell him that Georgie’s been to the grave.’

Frankie shrugged. Jed had no idea that she had taken Georgie to visit her dad in prison, but he knew that her dad had rung occasionally and that she had written to him. Deciding that her boyfriend was only being thoughtful, she smiled at him.

‘OK, but you lay the flowers for me.’

Being quite a deep person, Eddie told Stuart very little of his conversation with Gina.

‘You ain’t ’arf quiet. Are you OK, Ed? They ain’t told you you’ve gotta move to another wing, have they?’

Eddie cracked a smile. ‘Don’t worry, I ain’t being moved. I’ve told you before, the guvnor in here is shit-scared of me, and of losing his poxy job, so they ain’t ever gonna split us up, Stuie boy. I’m just tired, mate. I’m gonna read me book, see if it makes me fall asleep.’

As he pretended to read, Ed’s mind was a whirlwind of emotion. When he was with Gina, he felt no guilt whatsoever, but as soon as she wasn’t there, he was consumed by remorse.

Putting his book down beside him, Ed stared at the ceiling. He’d just promised to have kids with a woman he barely knew. They had never even been out on a date or anything, let alone lived together. Wondering if the prison system was fucking with his brain, Ed tried to erase his doubts from his mind. Gina obviously felt the same way as he did and she wasn’t banged up, so maybe it was the real deal. His thoughts turned to Frankie. Would she accept him moving on and having kids with another woman? Somehow he doubted it.

Thinking of Gina’s fit body, Eddie sighed. By the time he got released, Jessica would have been dead for about five years, so surely no one would begrudge him a bit of happiness, including Frankie?

Jed smiled as he bent down and showed his daughter Harry Mitchell’s grave.

‘Your great-nan and great-grandad are buried next to one another ’ere, Georgie girl. I never knew your great-nan, but great-grandad Harry was a horrible old shitcunt.’

Georgie looked at him inquisitively. Obviously, she couldn’t understand what her dad was saying, but Jed still got a buzz out of telling her.

As a grieving family walked past them, Jed nodded. ‘Bit nippy, ain’t it?’ he said politely.

He waited for them to be far enough away, then took all the flowers and cards that other people had left off Harry’s grave. ‘Where shall we put these, Georgie girl? Shall we move them to that grave over there that’s not got none?’ he said in a silly voice.